Council to GCTV: You've got 3 years to shape up
There wasn't much space to explain this in the paper (sorry, unposted), but there was a bit more to the move of Greensboro Community Television from the old Central Library annex on Greene Street to the city's Cultural Center.
Tuesday night, the city council was asked to approve a GCTV's lease in the Cultural Center. GCTV is getting booted from their old space to make room for Elon University's law school.
But it quickly turned into a discussion about the merits of the public access channel, which is funded by a surcharge on the cable bills of city residents. Tom Phillips started out by saying that the channel's programming was "awful" and questioned why the space wasn't given to other arts organizations. Don Vaughan, an attorney, questioned whether GCTV fit the legal requirements to be given space in the center.
Although the council eventually voted 6-2 to approve the lease (Phillips and Vaughan voted no), the message from the council was that when the contract with Time Warner Cable expires in three years, there will be no more funding for GCTV.
"You're not going to get any money out of this council in 3 years unless you dramatically change the programming that you've got," Robbie Perkins said.
We'll have more on this to come.
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